Public warned on add'l congressional seats eyed by CPP-NPA via 'defective' party-list system
Some four months into this year's elections, National Security Adviser Norberto Gonzales released anew a statement disclosing what he said were clear plans of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP) to gain more political power.
As such, harassments will happen, coercion from CPP-allied groups is expected and intimidation of voters is to be watched out for. And it would be the party's armed wing, the New People's Army (NPA) who will execute the task, Gonzales added, as he went on to state the party's supposed mission – to gain more seats in the House of Representatives.
In a news statement sent to The News Today (TNT), Gonzales who is also chair of the Partido Demoktratiko-Sosyalista ng Pilipinas (PDSP) said military documents confirmed the CPP plan "that will not hesitate to employ violence" come election time.
"Military documents also showed where the CPP party-list groups got their votes in the 2004 elections. The most substantial votes were delivered in Visayas and Mindanao through the CPP's guerilla fronts. The military said 85 of the group's 106 guerilla fronts worked to win votes nationwide. The highest number of votes, which translated to 60 percent share of party-list votes, was delivered by 28 guerilla fronts in eastern Mindanao and the Visayas, while the CPP's guerilla fronts in Northern Luzon and Southern Tagalog also managed to acquire votes," the news statement continued. "At least 229 municipalities considered strongholds of communist rebels gave the party-list groups substantial votes, the military documents revealed. With this record, Gonzales said the CPP will enhance its campaign "strategy" which is to win votes for its party-list candidates through harassment or intimidation by its "armed goons. The CPP stands out as the only political party in the country with a built-in private army. Gonzales and his group, the PDSP, maintain that communist rebels are exploiting the present defective party-list system to participate in mainstream politics and to gain access to government resources."